Govt must ensure farmers participation before acquiring farmland:JSV

Published: Tuesday, October 14, 2008, 21:03 [IST]

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New Delhi, Oct 14 (UNI) The Jan Sangarsh Vahini (JSV), which has been ''spreading protest'' against the acquisition of the farmlands in North-West Delhi today said the government must ensure participation of the farmers before initiating any move to acquire their lands and the administration should unilaterally decide the compensation for the acquired farmlands.

Farmers have been protesting against the acquisition of their lands and laid a seize to the District Collector's office in North-West Delhi for three weeks.

Voicing their demand, leader of the JSV, Bhupendra Singh Rawat, said the Delhi Government had also ''violated'' the Central government's norms for compensating the farm workers, share-croppers whose livelihood is directly dependent on the land to be acquired, in addition to the actual owners.

Till today, the Delhi government had not said a single word on the compensation to be offered to others who, too, will lose their means of livelihood, Mr Rawat said at a press conference here.

The Delhi Government had decided in 2005 to acquire 1,400 acres of land belonging to the villages- Karala, Sultanpur Dabad, Tikri Khurd, Tikri Khan, Alipur Bakauli and Kanhjawla for building industrial and residential complexes.

The agitating farmers, first led by those belonging to Kanjhawla, gheraoed the Delhi Vidhan Sabha from March 19 to Septmeber 10.

Later, they organised a mass meeting at the DC's office in Kanjhawala and the seize continued till today.

The farmers are damanding compensation equal to the prevailing market rate as high as Rs one lakh a square meter. And they rejected the government's offer to double the compensation which was fixed in 2005.